Count Basie “One O’Clock Jump” (1937): Count Basie was an R&B innovator. He is normally classified as a Jazz artist, but songs such as this one are the precursors to R&B and Rock and Roll. His orchestra used plenty of saxophone and the sound wouldn’t work without them.

Louis Jordan “Five Guys Named Moe” (1943): In my opinion, Louis Jordan is the first true R&B artist. He didn’t invent the style, but he was the first to truly understand how to combine jazz and blues into the style that evolved from his first recordings of the early ’40s into rock and roll in the ’50s. Louis Jordan played the saxophone.

Wynonie Harris “Good Rockin’ Tonight” (1948): This is one of the original jump blues classics that led directly to the music of Elvis Presley. This song kicks off with one of the most recognizable saxophone riffs in the history of rock and roll.

Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats “Rocket ’88” (1951): This song is often referenced as the first rock and roll record. It is important for its use of distorted electric guitar, but throughout the song is a driving saxophone laying down the main riff.

W.C. Handy was a ragtime bandleader whose music laid the foundation for the jazz of the ’20s. His most famous composition is “St. Louis Blues,” which used several horns including saxophone.

Fletcher Henderson’s band further advanced the use of saxophone in jazz, especially due to the playing of sax pioneer Coleman Hawkins.

Jazz took a giant leap forward with the music of Duke Ellington and Count Basie in the ’30s. The sax playing of Lester Young with the Count Basie Orchestra laid the foundation for the next phase of saxophone playing in the ’40s.

Saxophonist Charlie Parker invented bebop in the ’40s and influenced all jazz to come after.

By the 1950’s, the influence of Charlie Parker had led to an explosion of influential sax players throughout jazz. Of all of them, my favorite is Sonny Rollins.

Arguably, the most influential saxophonist was John Coltrane. He was not only a master of bebop and hard bop early in his career, but his influence on modal jazz and free jazz is still heard in much 21st century jazz. His groundbreaking work from 1962 until his death in 1967 sounds as fresh today as it did over fifty years ago.

One of the first artists to be recorded on saxophone was Rudy Wiedoeft. During the 1910s, he recorded several hundred songs for different labels and these recordings helped spread the popularity of the saxophone worldwide.

“Yakety Sax” was the theme song to The Benny Hill Show.

The new Pharoah Sanders album with producer Floating Points is on my list for Album of the Year. It is a meditative masterpiece that focuses all 46 minutes on a repetitive riff with alternating ebbs and flows that include electronic music, the London Symphony Orchestra, and the always beautiful sax artistry of Pharoah Sanders.

While recording their album, 4, Foreigner wanted to find someone who could lay down a sax solo like the legendary Junior Walker. When they realized that Walker was performing in town, they asked him to come in and he laid down one of the most recognizable rock and roll sax solos ever recorded.

Bobby Keys was one of the most important rock and roll sax players from the age of thirteen in 1956 until his death in 2014 at the age of seventy. He was born in Lubbock, TX and toured with local legend Buddy Holly in the late ’50s. He recorded hundreds of songs with dozens of artists, but his most important role was as the sax player for the Rolling Stones from 1969 into the 21st century. He became great friends with Keith Richards after they met in 1964 and began recording with The Stones on Let It Bleed. Keys later became great friends with Mick Jagger, for whom he served as best man at Jaggers’ wedding, before blowing an entire tour’s salary on a bathtub full of champagne and drawing the ire of Jagger. Bobby Keys somehow lived (and survived) the ultimate rock and roll life even though he was never an official member of any famous bands.

Roland Kirk is one of my favorite jazz artists. He progressed from performing fairly straight-forward jazz in the ’50s to becoming one of the most influential leaders of avante-garde jazz in the ’60s and ’70s. He often played multiple horns at once. He was a master of circular breathing which allowed him to play extended notes for several minutes. This video provides a complete Roland Kirk show, live in ’72 when he was at the peak of his experimental powers. The entire concert is great, but you can jump to around one hour to see him play multiple horns and a cymbal at the same time, followed by about 7 minutes of circular breathing mastery. There is also an iconic multi-horn solo from minutes 18 to 24.

Danny Federici (organ), Gary Tallent (bass), and Clarence Clemons (saxophone) are the only members of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band to appear on all of the Boss’ records from his debut, Greetings from Asbury Park, through Born in the U.S.A, but everyone would agree that Clemons was the most important member of the band. The addition of Clemons to the band in 1972 was instrumental in turning a really good band into the greatest rock and roll band of the 70s. The story of how Springsteen and Clemons (aka The Big Man) met evolved through stories told over decades of live shows, so it is a little boring to just say that Springsteen and Clemons knew each other from other bands and finally got together. I prefer to believe that The Big Man walked into a club out of the fog, his silhouette slowly becoming a clear figure of a giant wielding a saxophone, leaped up onto the stage, and blew out a thunderous sax solo that shook the walls and exploded into the future of rock and roll.

The Big Man died ten years ago. Springsteen has moved on over the last decade, producing more quality albums and starring in a wonderful one-man Broadway show, but the beauty and power of The Big Man’s saxophone still stands out on every listen of Springsteen’s classic songs. The magic moment when two artists come together to change the sound of rock and roll are rare, and Springsteen/Clemons are on the short list that includes partnerships such as Lennon/McCartney, Jagger/Richards, and Page/Plant.

Steely Dan “Aja”: The title track to the band’s seventh album is about as jazz as pop music can get. The album includes performances by several amazing musicians, but the most impressive of them all is Wayne Shorter.

Wayne Shorter has been described as the greatest living jazz composer and improviser. He began his career as the composer for Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. He then worked with Miles Davis before co-founding the influential fusion group Weather Report. His solo on “Aja” is perfect.

Black Country, New Road “Instrumental”: This is the first track on the band’s debut 2021 album. They are part of a new school of music that includes Black Midi, and they create a mix of prog rock, jazz, math rock, and other genres.

This song features overlaid saxophones with keyboards that settle into a nice groove, and then burst out with klezmer-influenced sax solos.

Todd Rundgren “Zen Archer”: Taken from Rundgren’s classic A Wizard/A True Star, this song features a fantastic sax solo at its conclusion. The entire album includes sax by both David Sanborn and Michael Brecker, two of the best session players of the 70s.